Charlie believed in cause and effect. Whenever one of his people noted a new phenomenon, Charlie challenged. He wanted to know the root cause. So he got a large charge at the tale that's been making the rounds about the Asqnomoris, a forest-dwelling people. It was a chilly autumn day when the members of the tribe approached the chief and asked if it was going to be a cold winter.

Offhandedly, he replied that yes, it would be a cold winter, and they should gather firewood for protection against the cold.

A day or two later, just to make sure, the chief telephoned the National Weather Service and asked if it was going to be a cold winter. He was assured that it would be. Reassured, he assembled his followers and urged them to collect more firewood because it would indeed be a cold winter.

Several days later, he called once again and was assured that it would be a very cold winter. So he called the tribe members and urged them to gather as much firewood as possible for protection against what would be a fierce winter.

And just to be on the safe side, he called the National Weather Service once more and asked if the people there were certain it would be a cold winter. "Absolutely," he was told, "The Asqnomoris are gathering firewood like crazy."

Not many years earlier, Charlie had been a fantastically wealthy individual. He had amassed a fortune in common stocks thanks to remarkable timing when the market was rocketing up. He owned vast quantities of equities.

By and by, he faced the problem of what to do with his enormous wealth. He already owned a large number of expensive toys: vintage cars, the latest sports cars, houses and fantastical furnishings. Yet he yearned for something new. As good fortune would have it, he was offered a trip in the very latest invention-a time machine.

He seized the opportunity and dashed into the future, where he immediately looked up the latest issue of EE Times to see what Rostky was ranting about in his By George column. But his eye was caught by the news that, on the afternoon of the very day he left, the stock market collapsed. He leaped into his time machine, raced back to the morning of the day he left, and immediately sold all his holdings.

Charlie had to go back to work. One day, one of his engineers finished a blockbuster design, a killer app. In this case, Charlie didn't ask about the cause. He knew the root of the brilliant design was his own sterling leadership.